


Anthony Crowley's Podcast

by Rokikurama



Category: Bridget Jones's Diary - All Media Types, Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Alternate Universe - Bridget Jones Fusion, Aziraphale Loves Crowley (Good Omens), Blind Character, Blind Crowley (Good Omens), Good Omens Romcom, M/M, RomCom AU, featuring terrible/wonderful 90s music - you're welcome
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-04-11
Updated: 2020-09-13
Packaged: 2021-03-02 01:42:15
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,882
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23587081
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rokikurama/pseuds/Rokikurama
Summary: When your life is one Big, Gay Disaster, what's a modern man to do? Monetize it.AKA Crowley starts a podcastUpdates when RL allows.
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens), Crowley & Warlock Dowling, Crowley/Satan | Lucifer (Good Omens)
Comments: 56
Kudos: 124
Collections: Good Omens Human AUs, Good Omens Rom Com Event





	1. No exception

**Author's Note:**

> This is a Bridget Jones' Diary AU for Good Omens!
> 
> As you can tell from the tags, Crowley is blind in this story. I came to this after thinking about why he might wear his shades all the time. I've talked to some folks with personal experience and done my research, but as a sighted person, I still might get things wrong. My apologies for this--and please, all critiques welcome in the comments or on the GO Romcom discord.
> 
> As far as content warnings here, there's a brief mention of a (distant) family member non-con grabbing a character's butt, in the tone of the romcom source.

**Episode 42: Anthony Crowley**

[SEGMENT THEME PLAYS]

[Skrillex and Diplo with Justin Bieber, “Where Are Ü Now”]

WARLOCK: Hellllllloooooooo Nutters! Welcome to the St. Agnes School Radio Podcast. It’s Monday, so you know what that means—time to dream about getting out of this place by catching up with one of our alumni who managed it. Today we’ll be talking with Anthony Crowley, graduate of the Blind and Visually Impaired track and Class of 2006 valedictorian! He was voted “Most Likely to Set the World on Fire” by his graduating class, so we’re really excited to hear what he’s been up to. Let’s get him on the line.

[TELEPHONE RINGS]

[TELEPHONE RINGS]

[TELEPHONE RINGS]

[TELEPHONE RINGS]

WARLOCK: (hushed) What’s happening?

PEPPER: (hushed) He’s not picking up.

[TELEPHONE RINGS]

WARLOCK: (hushed) Mr. Pratchett sent him the thing, right?

[TELEPHONE RINGS]

PEPPER: (hushed) Yeah, and then I sent him the reminder. Two days ago.

[TELEPHONE RINGS]

[TELEPHONE RINGS]

WARLOCK: (hushed) Ummm… how long do you think we should wait?

PEPPER: (hushed) It’s not like we’ve got anyone else to call!

[TELEPHONE RI—]

CROWLEY: (groaning) Hello?

WARLOCK: Hello, um, Mr. Crowley?

CROWLEY: Yeah? Whossdis?

WARLOCK: …This is the St. Agnes School Radio Podcast? 

CROWLEY: Wha?

WARLOCK: You’re the alumni guest today, and—

CROWLEY: (more groaning) Oh god. No no no no. Noooooo. The school…thing. Thing.

WARLOCK: Yep, that thing! Little hungover this morning, huh? Wild night?

CROWLEY: (more groaning) Look—ugh--it was Lee’s birthday, okay, and I—wait.  You’re, uh, like, 11, right? What do you know about hangovers?

WARLOCK: I’m 17, sir, and I’m blind, not deaf. For our Deaf audience, our producer  Pepper has just updated the simultaneous transcript to reflect that alumni guest Crowley “sounds like sh—“ (hushed voice) Pepper! We can’t curse on the show anymore! (normal voice) Uhhh, “sounds like roadkill smells.” (hushed voice) Yeah, loads better, thanks.

CROWLEY: Ohmygod…why did I agree to do this?

WARLOCK: Well, the reply form says here that you’re “Passionately committed to communicating with disabled and special needs child—“ 

CROWLEY: —Yeah yeah yeah I remember. (heavy groan) Let’s just get this over with, alright?

WARLOCK: There’s that Nutter spirit!

CROWLEY: (inaudible)

WARLOCK: So, why don’t we start off with you introducing yourself?

CROWLEY: Sure. Uh. Hiii. I’m…Crowley. Graduated in, um… while back. I live in, uh, London, and I work in publishing. You know, books. Publishing…books.

WARLOCK: We know. Are you a bibliophile, then?

CROWLEY: Gods no. Eww. Do I sound like someone who hangs around in bookshops?

WARLOCK: Um. I guess not? So, why work in publishing?

CROWLEY: Mwaaargh, well, you’ve gotta take what you can get in this economy, dontcha? I do the PR. Press releases. Social media. That kind of thing. Really, the less I know about the books, the better. Sound like, ugh, literary masturbation, mostly.

PEPPER: (hushed) Oh my God.

WARLOCK: (hushed) I know.

CROWLEY: Oy I can hear you, you know!

WARLOCK: Sorry, sir! Don’t worry we can, uh, edit that out for the final podcast version.

PEPPER: (hushed) Won’t, though.

CROWLEY: You littl—

WARLOCK: —Sooooo, um, I was going to ask about, uh, your advice for current students, but. Like, now, I just want to know—what happened?

CROWLEY: Piss off.

WARLOCK: No, I mean it. Seriously. You were valedictorian, went to a top university, job in the big city, supposed to “set the world on fire,” everything they tell us to do, but, um, fifteen years later you’re hungover at 10 am and hate your job. You work in social media, but currently have less followers on Twitter than my dad. So. Like. Man. What happened?

CROWLEY: …

WARLOCK: Advice on, ah, “What Not To Do”, maybe?

[DIALTONE]

* * *

It was at that very moment, having (metaphorically) run away and hid from bloody teenagers and lying in bed with his head throbbing, the stale reek of eau de “too pissed to shower before falling asleep” clinging to everything, that Anthony Crowley decided he needed to make a change. Crowley came to this decision entirely on his own. In no way whatsoever was his thinking prompted by any questions asked by snotty, annoying, chipper little teenagers who probably thought One Direction originated the whole boy band concept. The timing was entirely coincidental. Fuck, they probably even thought Justin Timberlake was an actor. No. Not for Crowley. He was going to (again, metaphorically) drive himself, not let the fear take the wheel and steer. No more chasing waterfalls.

Apparently, Step 1 of this life-altering plan of incredible genius was to stop listening to crap music from his own high school years. He’d develop a taste in music that was simultaneously countercultural, yet cultivated. Step 2: Start a podcast. The subject would be his life, of course, because it was obviously very, very, very interesting. Said podcast would clearly become a brilliant viral success overnight, causing any and all condescending little teenage shits who heard it to immediately @ him, begging for his sage advice about life, the universe, and the many different ways you could braid your own hair. (Crowley was rather proud of all of his hair designs--they made his head feel fancy.) Step 3: Profit. Duh. Step 3 is always profit.

Crowley felt slightly more like a functioning adult after a shower and as much water and paracetamol as he could stomach. Past Crowley had somehow possessed the foresight to take the day after Lee’s birthday off from work ages ago, (good Past Crowley! You can have a cookie. Oooh, or a tequila. Or, if memory served--not entirely a sure thing--five tequilas?) so he had the whole day free to plot his course to podcast stardom and total life makeover. He’d made it up to debating whether he should get a kingsnake or a ball python for his Signature Celebrity Accessory when his mobile rang, the dulcet tones of Chumbawumba’s “Tubthumping” reminding him that he should maybe put more of a rush on Step 1.

Crowley pressed the answer button on his headset and, in lieu of greeting, said, “Whoever you are, go away.”

There was a pause.

“Uhhh, is this…Crowley? Anthony Crowley?”

“So people keep telling me.”

Another pause, as whoever had the nerve to call him on his day off tried to rally. Ah, there it was, the awkward service-industry laugh.

“Very funny, sir. I’m, um, Eric, the substitute driver. Come to—“ 

“Isn’t ‘Eric’ the regular driver? You do sound different, though.”

“Yes, hah, it’s…a thing. But he’s ‘Erik’ with a K, and I’m ‘Eric’ with a C, so really it’s very different…”

Crowley tuned Eric-with-a-C out and felt wrinkles piling up on his forehead as his brain struggled to shift gear. He certainly hadn’t called for the driver. As much as he enjoyed blissful car-borne mobility with someone actually trained to assist him, (which, for the record, was so, so, so much) any interaction with his parents (and their money) was liable to result in a phone call enumerating all the varied, exciting, and ever-increasing ways in which Crowley was disappointing them. He rationed that shit out very carefully.

“So, uh, do you want me to come up to your flat or are you good to take the elevator down?”

“Why?”

“I’m here to pick you up? You know, for the benefit?”

Crowley’s soul exited his body in a deep groan. Of course Past Crowley hadn’t taken today off work all those weeks ago in a moment of psychic intuition re: hangover. It had been for the fucking benefit. Pity he couldn’t take Past Crowley’s alcohol away as punishment, since Today Crowley could really use another drink. And Future Crowley would be too busy trying to fend off a “hug” from his creepy Aunt Dolores, who somehow hadn’t gotten the memo that it wasn’t socially acceptable to grab your nephew’s arse, even if she did think he was “just such a handsome young man!”

The fucking benefit, aka the Gehenna Valley Manor Charity Spring Festival, aka his parents’ Annual Attempt to Give a Shit, was Crowley’s least favorite familial obligation. It swarmed with aunts and uncles and cousins and random folks from the village, not to mention his parents’ pet social climbers. (appearing in the role of “friends”) He couldn’t go 10 minutes without someone trying to socialize via loudly recounting an embarrassing story of him as a child. These existed in seemingly inexhaustible supply, due to Young Crowley’s total incomprehension of the purpose of trousers. And pants. And shirts, come to it. It’d been much more fun to strip off and jump in, well, whatever he fancied jumping in. Paddling pools, mud puddles, leaf piles. On one—and only one—very notable occasion, a sandbox. He could feel so much more of the world without clothes in the way, (that had rather been the problem with the sandbox, in fact) and all the sighted grown-ups’ panicked screeching was extremely entertaining. When he was six. 

At thirty-something, hearing ad nauseum about his misadventures as the pantless wonder was remarkably less so. It made for a very special kind of hell when combined with his mother’s yearly attempts to “get you settled with a man who can take care of you when I’m gone.” She usually had her eye on some poor bastard who met what she considered the essential standards of marriageability: six-figure job, vague inclination towards men, and breath in his lungs. Crowley’s opinion really didn’t come into it. 

He had a suspicion that this year would be no exception.


	2. Lead Balloon

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Well, that went well.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, ah, ever so slightly later than "the following Friday," I'm finally back here with the next chapter! RL has been... yeah. A Lot. As it is for many folks. I can only thank everyone who commented (Thank you SO MUCH) and who've been writing amazing stuff for getting me back into the zone again. Also beta-ed by the lovely RunningTurnip and with many, many thanks to SortOfSunny for insight into living with visual impairment. Any mistakes on that end continue to be mine, and please please please *do* tell me in the comments or elsewhere. (I'm about on the GO Events discord, same username)
> 
> Anyway. Hope you enjoy and (fingers crossed) more to come!

**Twitter Direct Message History with @HalSturn**

VERY unprofessional taking vacation

u couldnt even send out ur own lame community service spotlight?

Sent 1:17

im not doing it for you

lazy git

Twitter & yt supposed to be ur job

YOU can explain to Nic why we missed a week

Sent 1:18

Fine. I’ll do it.

But 

You. Owe. Me.

Sent 1:27

**Notification: You were mentioned in a tweet.**

@IlliteratiIndies tweeted “Check out our very own Social Media Assistant @AnthonyJCrowley appearing as a special guest on @StAgnesPod giving advice to current students #illiteratigives #inspiring #disabilityspeaks”

**DM from @HalSturn**

ur mate Lee came by the office 

fixes computers and v fit

that Lee

I want his number

Sent 1:28

* * *

Crowley’s phone pinged once through his earbud, letting him know he had a Twitter notification. And then it kept on going, like a demented woodpecker intent on drilling into his skull, finding the headache that was mercifully fading away, and giving it CPR.

“Stop here a sec,” Crowley said to Eric, who’d been guiding him from the parking lot and across the lawn into the fray. For an event at least ostensibly set up to benefit the disabled, the actual fête was annoyingly inaccessible, year in and year out. He’d already discovered--fortunately with his white cane instead of his foot--random croquet hoops that were apparently sunk into the ground with cement. Crowley didn’t particularly fancy trying to walk and text. He unlocked his phone and flicked his finger over the screen.

“You have thirteen direct messages from Hal Sturn,” the phone read out at high speed. “First message: Very unprofess--”

Crowley stabbed at the screen to shut it up. Hal Sturn was Illiterati Books’ other social media manager, who by virtue of being hired a whole nine days prior to Crowley fancied himself Crowley’s supervisor. If he had to be  _ here _ , he sure as hell was  _ not _ at work. In fact, now that he thought of it…

“Bentley,” he said to the phone to activate the assistant program, “silence all Twitter notifications.”

“Twitter notifications silenced for three hours,” Bentley dutifully confirmed.

Irritating Hal always cheered Crowley right up. Suddenly he was no longer noticing the squelch of mud underfoot but the kiss of warm spring sunshine on his skin. The heady, mouth-watering aroma of fudge temporarily overpowered that of the petting zoo. (Crowley had strong opinions about sweets. It wasn’t that he was  _ hiding _ a sweet tooth, per se, so much as that his mother hadn’t approved of him eating them growing up and he had to make his limited opportunities count.) He’d indubitably found a soulmate in dear old Madame Tracy’s annual offering of gummy worm-riddled chocolate-peanut butter fudge. It was really the only thing he looked forward to at these benefits. The fact that her fudge’s extremely  _ distinctive _ texture and flavour profile nauseated most everyone else was just a side bonus. Crowley even found it within himself to whistle a light melody over the baseline of the portable electricity generators thrumming away to inflate bounce houses and heat up grills. The sinister off-key calliope whistling of the merry-go-round tuning up, however, sharply reminded Crowley that he had time-sensitive business to complete.

“So, Eric. Pop quiz. What do you do if you see my Aunt Dolores?”

“Uh, hand you a tissue and warn her not to get too close, you’re feeling ill.”

“Uncle George?”

“Start a--quoting you here, sir--‘stereotypically gay’ conversation.”

“Chase and his wanker partner Juan?”

“Anything  _ except _ a stereotypically gay conversation.”

“Kid under the age of ten making irritating sounds?”

“Convince nearby distressed adults that you didn’t  _ intentionally _ trip the child with your white cane.”

“Outstanding.”

“Just to, uh, confirm, but you,” Eric hesitated. “You won’t actually trip children. Intentionally. Will you?”

“Noooo, of course not,” Crowley said in his most reasonable, comforting, supportive voice. (the one he’d used recently to reassure a senior Illiterati author that his “rad” promotion idea of #GloriousTool would  _ definitely _ go viral.) “Sometimes their guardians are just, you know, confused. And if you see my mother?”

“Ah, hello, Lady Crowley!” Eric said very loudly. That was rather the opposite of what he was supposed to do, but at least it gave Crowley a few seconds to brace himself.

“Anthony Crowley!” his mother said, with her gift for making his very name sound like an accusation. “What  _ have _ you done to yourself?”

“Hello to you too, mother,” Crowley muttered. He then made a very dignified noise of protest that in no way resembled a squawk as impatient fingers landed on his head and ripped at the complex zipper braid he’d spent the whole drive down working on.

“What have I told you about your hair, child?” 

“I’m in my thirties, mother--”

“Shocking that you still have such little sense.”

“--I have a career. I live on my own. In London. And it’s  _ my _ hair.”

She snorted. Crowley was sure his mother would categorize the sound as a ‘genteel dismissive sniff,’ but he knew what he heard. 

“What you have is an apparently dead end job managing so-called ‘social media,’ and a rent-free flat in one of our buildings. Now,” she said, having disassembled an hour’s worth of braiding, weaving, and pinning, “that’s much better. Your hair is one of your best features. You need to show it off. Toss it around, not mash it to your skull.”

“I’ll keep that in mind in case I meet any young men of good fortune on my way to the fudge.”

“Honestly, Crowley,” she snapped. “Be serious. The Darcys are here, and they’ve brought their son Aziraphale. Some kind of lawyer. He’s very successful and very very very gay.” There it was, Crowley thought. This year’s eligible bachelor. Lady Crowley sighed dramatically, no doubt in response to whatever was going on with his face. “Your father and I are not going to be around forever, you know. I worry about you. And you’re not getting any younger either. It hurts me that you seem to have no interest in your own future.” 

With those maternal guilt bombs dropped, she instructed Eric on where Crowley should be sitting so his father could easily point him out as the inspiration for their charity work during the benefit welcome speech--always a highlight of Crowley’s day--and then finally left them to it. Presumably so she could go make someone else feel bad about themselves in the guise of caring for them. (It had taken Crowley more than a few therapy sessions to figure that one out. So it was really very annoying that it still worked.) 

* * *

Walking around the fête’s assortment of pie tables, biscuit booths, and lemonade tents, Crowley learned several interesting facts about Eric. Number One, he had all the backbone of a limp noodle when it came to elderly people asking him to try their food. (“What in the nine hells was that?! How was it squishy  _ and _ dry at the same time???” “I told you: Don’t listen to them. Listen to me.”) Number Two, he was a romance novel fiend. Who even knew that Jane Austen had an obscure, possibly unfinished epistolary novel called  _ Lady Susan _ ? Eric did. It was his favorite. (Fact Two-B was that Eric’s taste was appalling. How could you rate anything above the stone-cold masterpiece that was  _ Pride and Prejudice _ ? But Crowley made no comment. He wasn’t the type to hang around book shops, after all. No, his romance fixation was strictly between him and his audiobook app checkout cart.) But fourth--and most delicious--was the fact that Eric had a boyfriend. Named “Eriq.”

“It’s not funny!” Eric protested. Crowley was laughing too hard to argue.

They sat down at their appointed table to wait for the welcome speech and let Eric rant about his “curse.”

“I mean, you don’t turn down a good job just because you’re going to have a co-worker named almost your name.”

“Sure, sure.”

“And I didn’t know Eriq’s name until, uh, later on, and he’s damn handsome and funny and a good dancer and--”

“Mmm-hmm. I’m just wondering about calling out  _ your own name _ when you’re about to--”

“Shut it, you’re an arsehole,” Eric snapped. And then paused. “Um. Sir.”

“You speak only the truth,” Crowley said. “And unlike my parents, I remember that the year is 2020, not 1920.”

Whatever Eric replied with was lost under the very distinctive farting noise of a rapidly deflating balloon, followed shortly by the aggressive tinkle of breaking china and a wave of shrieking childish laughter. 

“Now, now--see here!” said a high, prissy, and utterly scandalized male voice.

“I TOLD you it wasn’t magic! Just a balloon hidden under the dish!” a young boy shouted triumphantly.

“Yes, yes, yes, fine. You’re, ah, very clever. Good boy! But oh! What’s this behind your ear?”

“You had it in your hand!”

“Boo!” shouted a chorus of other childish voices.

“I most certainly did not!”

“You’re rubbish! We want a  _ real _ magician!”

“Yeah!!!”

“Set something on fire! Magicians on telly always set things on fire!”

“Ah...well. But if we did that, we’d scare away our old friend,” the man said, chewing the scenery with no shame whatsoever, “Harry the Rabbit!”

Apparently the worst magician in the history of the art had a posh Oxbridge accent, no stage presence at all, and a tough crowd of six to nine-year-old village children in the tent behind them. Crowley’s stomach roiled with second-hand embarrassment as the magician accidentally dropped “our friend Harry the rabbit,” (who had the good sense to scarper) sat on the egg he’d made “disappear,” couldn’t find the silk scarves that were supposed to appear, was interrupted by irate volunteers from the food tent who’d found Harry the rabbit nibbling his trauma away inside their salad bowl, and failed four times in a row to produce the right playing card for a very unimpressed little girl. Crowley had to hand it to the bugger, though. He was persistent. Rather nice voice too, if you didn’t pay attention to what he was actually, you know, saying. 

When the speakers crackled on for Lord Crowley’s official welcome speech and cut the show short, Crowley counted it a mercy killing. He stood up at the appropriate pause in his father’s droning and wiggled his fingers in a wave he knew irritated his mother. But she knew he hated being held up as an object of pity, so there. Now they’d both be unhappy. As the afternoon air chilled into evening and assorted visitors dropped by their table, Crowley amused himself by imagining how any of this experience might be converted into an entertaining podcast episode, and what the chances were of him being disinherited if his parents ever heard it. 

He was desperately trying to convince his creepy Aunt Dolores that she’d definitely brushed out the (likely nonexistent) twigs in his hair and could stop stroking it now when Eric’s loud greeting announced that his mother was back in the vicinity. Crowley was almost grateful. He could, at least, count on her to pry Aunt Dolores off of him and banish her to tables unknown. Especially since this time, she had company.

“Oh, and there he is, speak of the devil! Crowley, darling, I was just telling Aziraphale that he absolutely must meet you-- _ properly _ , this time.”

The chair next to him dragged across the grass, and Crowley obligingly put his hand out to shake. Aziraphale’s hand was soft, warm, and adorned with an interesting pinkie ring. Handshake firm but not the prelude to an arm wrestling contest. Just… good. (the opening guitar chords of “Kiss Me” absolutely did  _ not _ start playing in his mind; Step One in the path to podcast stardom had been activated.) Even his mother had to pick a winner at some point, right? By the laws of bloody chance, if nothing else. And then Aziraphale Darcy opened his mouth. 

“Well, hello Anthony.”

Oh. My. God. He was the magician.

“Your mother was just telling me, ah, how you came to my birthday party once when we were boys.”

“Oh, you’re the Darcy boy!” Aunt Dolores crowed and clapped her hands in amusement. That was a very bad omen, but Crowley was still reeling from having daydreamed, however briefly, about the sodding  _ magician _ . “Little Crowley never could keep his pants on, could he! Not that much has changed from what I hear of his love life, eh, Crowley?”

Crowley opened his mouth to say something, anything, to stop the landslide, but she poked him in the stomach. Crowley absolutely did not squeak. “Only difference is who he’s chasing around the paddling pools, if you know what I mean. Oh, I remember your poor little cousin Lilith, no brothers to know what’s what from, just kept screaming ‘snake! snake!’”

“Dolores!” Crowley’s mother hissed, like any game Crowley might have had wasn’t already thoroughly compromised. “Isn’t that your Edgar I see over there?”

“What? Where? I don’t--”

“Let’s go find him out,” Lady Crowley said. 

“Oh, I’m sure he’s just fine, the old fool.”

“Leave. The. Young. People. Alone. Mmm?” Aziraphale gave a rather forced little laugh as Lady Crowley bit out her words. Crowley reflected that no matter how embarrassing a given situation was, his family could always be counted on to make it worse. “And you too, Eric. My husband needs you.”

“Uh--”

“Over there. Now. To...guide someone.”

Case in fucking point. Footsteps retreated in all directions as he and Aziraphale sat in awkward silence.

“So,” Crowley said finally. “You do magic.”

“Oh yes!” Aziraphale sounded way, way too excited to talk about this. “Specifically, I practice sleight of hand and illusion. As a hobby, you know. You heard the show earlier, then, I take it?”

“Yeah.” Crowley said, deliberately ignoring the wheedling for feedback he heard in Aziraphale’s tone.

“Well, don’t keep me in suspense! What did you think?” Dammit.

“Went down like a lead balloon,” Crowley said bluntly. The man  _ was _ asking. “Kids are a tough crowd. Never tangle with them myself.”

“Oh,” Aziraphale said, with all the misery of a kicked puppy, and Crowley's stomach twisted. “I see. I did rather fear that might be the case, but I’d hoped, well. Uh. Right. Yes. Lead balloon. Rather. Ah, thank you. ‘Honesty’s always the best policy,’ they say.”

Crowley grunted, not sure how to take being thanked for telling someone they’d publicly humiliated themselves. Aziraphale said something about going to get them some cake, but Crowley was distracted by his phone suddenly beeping and vibrating off the table like a thing possessed. Apparently his three hours of silenced notifications were up, and Bentley had words for him. Specifically, the words that “A tweet you were mentioned in has 649 replies and 3.4 thousand retweets.” Crowley frantically tapped and swirled his finger around the screen. None of that made any sense whatsoever. What could he _possibly_ have been mentioned in to be getting engagement like that? Bentley spat out information at high speed as Crowley searched urgently for the oldest notification. And then he found it.

“Oh _ fuck, _ ” Crowley breathed in horror. Hal had... Hal had tweeted out the podcast. From the main company account. "I'm going to be sacked."


	3. Stroke of Demonic Genius, Darling

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content warning for: Mentions of sexual harassment at work to a minor character, homophobic attitude mentioned briefly

“Ok. Ok-ok-ok-ok. So,” Crowley said as soon as the conference call connected, “The key point here is not to squander this unparalleled opportunity for Illiterati.”

The other participants’ silence felt like a physical thing, reaching through the line and trying to throttle him. Hal would definitely be having thoughts of that nature. But Crowley had successfully seized the initiative. Step 1 in Master Plan 2.0 (subtitle: Save Your Arse) accomplished.

“Well,” Crowley’s actual boss Nicholas Scratch said finally, “there’s a word for ‘dismissable offense’ I haven’t heard before.”

“There’s no changing what’s happened.” Crowley plowed ahead. “Only what we do in response. Right now, whatever else, we have people’s attention. In a social media world, attention is opportunity.”

Bentley alerted Crowley that he had a private text message, which he let play into his headphones on another channel.

Hal from bloody work: what the fuck do you think you’re playing at  
Hal from bloody work: you incompetent arsewipe asshole

Fortunately, Crowley had anticipated such a response and had several appropriate texts pre-recorded and saved in his drafts. After realizing the situation’s gravity, (i.e. that his parents would absolutely force him to move back home if he lost his job) Crowley’s brain had clicked into a gear he hadn’t accessed in a very, very long time. One even higher than whatever Eric was currently using to speed them back to London amid a chorus of honks and the invigorating sensation of sheer acceleration pushing Crowley back into his seat.

Me: IF you want Lee’s number, THEN you like my plan  
Hal from bloody work: fuck you  
Me: get me sacked and I’m sending him the christmas karaoke party video  
Me: yeah the one of you trying to do Sarah McLachlan and breaking down into ugly cry halfway  
Hal from bloody work: you wouldn’t dare  
Me: try me (YouTube private video link attached)

“Nothing the internet likes better than irony and a bit of cheek,” Crowley said into the call, hoping to avoid giving Hal any time to think about it. (It was never a good idea to let Hal think about anything. Assuming he actually had higher functions of thought, which Crowley still wasn’t certain of.) “as the podcast’s, ah, rapid spread proves. And that plays perfectly into our core brand identity of Illiterate. Literati. Already a contradiction in terms. Sarcasm personified.”

“That’s...a...good...point,” Hal said. Helpfully. From his tone, you’d think he was dragging the words kicking and screaming out from their place of safety to be shot against the wall, but it was still a genuinely helpful comment. (Crowley would usually have felt guilty about dangling a friend out as bait like this, but in amongst the Twitter notifications he’d gotten a horrifying--if convenient--voicemail from Lee wondering if there were possibly two Hal’s at Illiterati, one of them Crowley’s wanker co-worker who he complained about constantly and another who was “awkward but kinda cute, like in a manly way.”) Ordinarily he’d try to talk sense into Lee, but desperate times call for letting your friends make their own damn mistakes. He was a grown man. And one very capable of sending fuckwits packing, once Lee realized their true nature. (This is actually how Lee and Crowley met. Lee heckled one of Crowley’s own mistakes, who’d kept on confusing Crowley’s “yes for tonight” with “yes for whenever,” out of a coffeeshop)

The call was still utterly silent. Crowley concentrated on not biting through his cheek. There was always a moment, when you were spinning complete and total utter bollocks, where your mark--excuse him, audience--had to buy in or back out. Trying to push just made you sound desperate. Which would be, you know, an accurate assessment of Crowley’s mental state, but not a particularly helpful look for high-stakes negotiations.

“Alright, Crowley,” Nicholas said slowly, amusement clear in his voice as if he knew what Crowley was doing but was willing to indulge him. And fuck but if hearing Nicholas roll Crowley’s name around in his velvety jaguar voice didn’t divert blood to areas decidedly not requiring it during his brain’s time of need. “Say I was willing to entertain the possibility of not immediately sacking you. What are you actually proposing?”

“Book review podcast,” Crowley said. “Sarcastic, irreverent, stirring up trouble. Monty Python for the indie lit crowd. Have me host, so we play off the St. Agnes podcast as viral marketing.” Someone inhaled sharply like they were about to object, so Crowley kept going. “Not criticizing our releases, necessarily, but comps. Historical, current, whatever. Namedrop our titles in at the right moments. I can guarantee you eyeballs. Or, uh, ears. Eardrums? Not sure exactly--”

“Yes, Crowley, we get the idea,” Hal interrupted him roughly. “That would, uh, synergize well with current campaigns and overall social media promotion strategy.” Someone asked a question about financials and Crowley’s stomach sank, but Hal started rattling off facts and figures like he’d been in on the idea from the start. Damn but Crowley was impressed. He had to get Lee to take him shopping if the man was pulling like this.

“We’ll do it,” Nicholas said finally, and Crowley exhaled the breath he’d been holding since his phone started tap dancing on the garden table. “We’ll call it ‘Blind Man Reading.’” Crowley rolled his eyes. (he’d mastered that particular facial expression even at the tender young age when he still had usable sight) But it was catchy and by no means the worst name he could’ve imagined, even if it did suggest he was going to be the butt of the joke. Fine. He could work with that. Self-deprecating humor was his wheelhouse. And, crucially, he wasn’t being sacked. At least not yet. 

“Crowley, you’re on a short leash with this,” Nicholas continued. “I want to see your skinny arse at your desk when I get in tomorrow, and I’m not letting you out of my sight until it’s done.” 

~

Some uncountable number of hours later, words, books, and even energy drinks had lost all meaning to Crowley’s brain. But the pilot episode was finally recorded and edited to everyone’s satisfaction. Hal had signed off. Legal had signed off. The relevant Illiterati authors had signed off. Samuel Pepys, the main author Crowley was slagging off, had (conveniently) been dead for some 300+ years. So that took care of him. Most importantly, Nicholas had signed off. Blind Man Reading was going out into the world.

Despite working straight through what was probably the entire weekend, (minus a few kips in the break room) Crowley didn’t feel even the least bit tired. No. He. Was. Electric. He’d made something! Something that, in the end, he was actually proud of. When was the last time he’d fucking done that? Decades, it felt like. Centuries. Millennia. He’d originally regretted sacrificing Master Plan 1.0 to a job that he, well... “Hated” would imply a lot more attention than Crowley usually paid his work. “Tolerated” was more his speed. But he’d snuck some of that material in, little observations about his life that had been rolling around in his head and gathering layers of sarcastic insight. It’s how they’d landed on diaries and memoirs in the first place. (plus, of course, the three memoirs Illiterati had just released. It was probably fortunate that Crowley hadn’t read them--allowed him to leave that part of the script to Nicholas without feeling too guilty.)

Nicholas had loved it. All of it. His exact words were “stroke of demonic genius, darling.” Crowley might have to get them tattooed onto his body. If you’d asked him before the Twitter storm, Crowley would have put even odds on Nicholas not even knowing his name. The few times they had interacted, Crowley was too busy trying to keep his voice level while his hindbrain squealed in horny. (Nicholas draping himself over the back of Crowley’s chair, his lips a whisper away from Crowley’s cheek, seemingly intent on the analytics window Crowley was explaining, had a place of honor in his 100% appropriate sex-on-a-desk fantasies) Goosebumps were a regular feature. But now! Now, he was a star. Actually, fuck stars. He was a comet. 

“Imma comet, flying through the air with the greatest of ease!” Crowley swooped the hand not holding his white cane through the air. He’d been certain the elevator was along this corridor somewhere, but the door was playing hard to get. 

“I think you’ll find those are acrobats, dear,” said an amused but also weirdly familiar voice. “Comets blaze through the heavens. Acrobats fly through the air with the greatest of ease. Or perhaps that’s the ‘Stupendous-Man’ playing at the cinema.” 

Crowley jumped. He had not exactly been aware he was speaking aloud. It was possible that he was a teensy bit more tired than he’d thought.

“I’m Aziraphale,” the voice said. Crowley frowned as his white cane tapped against yet another disappointingly wooden and decidedly non-elevator-y door. “Uh that is, I’m Aziraphale Darcy? We met on Friday, if you recall?”

“Oh, right, yeah, the rubbish magician with nice hands,” Crowley said before his brain could stop him, and he winced. When energy drink hit a particular concentration in his bloodstream, it dissolved his brain-to-mouth filter. But Aziraphale just laughed. He had a nice laugh. A delighted little tinkle that warmed you from the inside out. Like...whatever the opposite of goosebumps was.

“You know you’re practically volunteering as a test audience, with these reviews,” Aziraphale said. Wait. Was Aziraphale...flirting? With Crowley? Even after he’d verbalized (if we’re being charitable) a brain fart? “Might I help you get anywhere in particular?”

“Uh, elevator to the lobby?” Crowley said and took Aziraphale’s offered arm. “Thanks.” His suit jacket had the slightly pebbly feel of fine natural linen, but the fabric had worn slightly into downy softness. Crowley approved. He’d broken off more than a few relationships over polyester. (Nasty material. Didn’t deserve to be called “fabric.”) Not that he was thinking about dating Aziraphale! His mother’d be picking out wedding china within the week if she heard they’d been seen together. On that point, actually...

“So, uh, why’re you here?” Crowley asked. Wonderful. Charming. “Not that, urgh, I mean not that you shouldn’t be here or anything. Just why, uh, here. Now. Instead of, um--”

“I work in the building,” Aziraphale said, mercifully cutting off Crowley’s verbal diarrhea. Fuck, he needed sleep. Probably also a shower, he realized with a sinking feeling as they shuffled into the always already stuffy air of the building’s elevators.

“Right, right. Yeah. Me too,” Crowley said, trying to sniff the air surreptitiously. (Though really, it would’ve taken a miracle for his deodorant to have lasted from the start of recording through to, what, Monday morning? Probably?) “We’ve got two floors in the basement.”

Aziraphale hmmed as they stepped off the elevator and into the lobby. The building was one of those modern arty ones, which meant any walls not physically underground were made of glass. Crowley stopped Aziraphale so he could dig out his sunglasses and armor up against the sudden light assault. Such a joy to be simultaneously light-sensitive and have trouble when it was dark.

“I suppose you couldn’t really oversee masturbation anywhere but a basement, even if it was primarily literary,” Aziraphale said airily. Crowley hoped that the noise he made at hearing Aziraphale’s posh, precise voice say “masturbation” was only inside his head. Jesus fuck, maybe he should be thinking about dating Aziraphale. Although this also implied that he’d heard the podcast of doom. And really, Crowley still wanted to round up everyone who’d done that and dump them into the sea.

“Of course not, or you lot upstairs would litigate us all into obliteration for ‘public indecency.’” Nicholas growled. From out of nowhere. Christ. People’s sexy bosses shouldn’t be allowed to just...just...just walk around freely like that! They should have bells on! Like cats! Nicholas used Crowley’s little surprised jump to jerk his arm off Aziraphale and tuck Crowley rather closely into his side. Where Nicholas’s deodorant was working perfectly well. (of course) A tempting whiff of Man mingled with the chill mint of his cologne. Crowley’s blush probably registered on the infrared spectrum at this point, but he was manfully going to ignore it. And that he was definitely sweating. Again.

“Mr. Scratch,” Aziraphale said coolly. “I was just walking Anthony out.”

“Nonsense. I’ve called us a car,” Nicholas said. Us? Crowley wondered. He had not been aware Nicholas was, ah, ...taking him home? Was that what was happening at this moment? “Can’t let my new star employee get lost on the tube.” Star employee? Had Crowley actually fallen asleep somewhere and dreamed all of this? Was nudity imminent? “Isn’t that right, Crowley?” Nicholas stressed Crowley’s name, which was kind of a dick move. Not a dream, then. Crowley felt kinda guilty for not correcting Aziraphale at the benefit, but his life had been in danger of spontaneous combustion. Silence lingered long enough to be awkward before Crowley realized both men were waiting for his input. Fools.

“Uh, right. Yeah,” Crowley said intelligently. And that was how he found himself in the blissfully cool, fresh-smelling back of a private car with a leather backseat so luxuriously buttery that Crowley was in danger of melting into it and never emerging again. Except, of course, that Nicholas was also there. The boss that he had absolutely never fantasized about. Especially not in a car. Particularly not while Nicholas said things like “brilliant” and “extraordinary” to Crowley in his luscious purr of a voice. It was a damn good thing Crowley’s jeans physically could not stretch away from his body or there might be a serious sartorial situation.

“So, how on earth do you know Aziraphale Darcy?” Nicholas finally asked, fingers drumming apparently unconsciously on Crowley’s knee. 

“Oh, just met him over the weekend. Family thing, you know how it is.” Crowley gibbered. The vast majority of his attention was grimly focused on preventing squeals of “omg it’s finally happeniiiiiiiiing!!!!” from getting anywhere near his mouth. “You? Uh. Know him, then. That is. Also?”

Nicholas sighed, as if the memory pained him. “That right, you didn’t join us until later, did you. Well. It’s not as though it’s a secret, I suppose. And you should know the kind of man you’re dealing with.”

“What happened? My mother’s dead keen on him,” Crowley said before he could shut himself up. Nicholas snorted.

“Mothers always are, it seems. I practiced law before I founded Illiterati. He was a very junior lawyer on one of my cases involving a young woman, Letitia Golshan. Daughter of immigrants, South London, you know the type. But smart as a whip. Got a prestigious internship with, well. I guess I shouldn’t name names, but a very senior minister with wandering hands.”

Crowley winced. He did know this story, or at least its outlines. It’d been Illiterati’s first big book, Memoir of an Intern. Very literary. Very controversial.

“She was never going to get justice in the courts,” Nicholas continued. “Women like that never do. But we could get her justice in the court of public opinion. The ‘righteous’ Mr. Darcy disagreed. He convinced his so-called mentors to have me fired and kept going until I was disbarred.”

“Those fuckers,” Crowley said and squeezed Nicholas’ hand where it still lay on his knee. He’d not heard this part of the story. It was hard to reconcile with the memory of a man desperately--and pathetically--trying to entertain a feral child horde with nothing but a disgruntled rabbit and dodgy silk scarves, but Crowley knew what his parents and their set were like. Law and order. Tradition and honor. Don’t you dare leave this house in that skirt, young man, I absolutely forbid it, it’s enough already that you’re gay. Put his back right up, it did.

“Thank you,” Nicholas said and squeezed back. “Really. But it turned out alright in the end, didn’t it? Pushed me into launching Illiterati seriously, all in. And see where that’s gotten us now!”

The car had, Crowley realized belatedly, stopped. “Uh, where’s that?” Nicholas laughed.

“You’re so cute, you know that? I meant the company. But we’re also at your building.”

“Oh,” Crowley said faintly. “Right.”

“Take the rest of the day off, of course, you’ve earned it. And I very much look forward to seeing you tomorrow, mmm?”

“Nnnrgaah yeah. Yes.” Shower. Definitely, definitely a shower.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Short chapter here, but I hope you still enjoyed! I've been having trouble with the bits after this so decided to finally just post what I had. Apologies for the long delays; I am still working on this, just hard to concentrate anymore. I'm thrilled if any of you are still interested, really.


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